PARKING CHAOS AT TOWN CENTRE TEST SITE

Vehicles destined for the continent were parked on side roads and left on doubleyellow lines as hauliers waited to be seen at a Covid-19 testing site.

Ashford’s drive-through facility on the Victoria Road car park had never been so busy after France reopened its border with the UK.

The lifting of the travel ban sparked a flurry of activity at the site, which opened on the edge of the town centre in June amid a high infection rate in the borough.

Last Wednesday afternoon, vans and huge HGVs were parked in Gasworks Lane and outside the Victoria Road Primary School as drivers waited for their slot, forcing some motorists to use the opposite side of the road to pass them.

Vehicles queued up outside the centre in Victoria Road

German driver Musa had delivered goods to Liverpool and was heading back to Kent when the French government announced the travel ban.

“I was one of the unlucky guys who just missed the last ferry,” he said.

“I was unlucky but that’s life - you have to be patient.”

A huge Jurgen Klopp fan,

Musa says he would have made the ferry if he hadn’t stopped in Liverpool to buy a football shirt.

In the summer, residents raised concerns over the location of the Ashford test centre, which is next to the primary school and overlooked by a busy footbridge behind the Elwick Place complex.

Liverpool fan Musa, from Germany, just missed the last ferry from Dover